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Growing avocados

Hardcore affair with a high success rate.

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In winter, when the garden is deserted, it's time for another amusement. You can grow beautiful things whose seeds you can get nearly for free. In this case the word nearly means that one can use cores that would normally end up in waste. Instead, one can draw exotic plants from it. An avocado for example.

Some seeds need special methods to let them grow. This also applies to the avocado, but it is very simple. You cut the avocado in the middle and take care not to hurt the core. After you have snacked the delicious fruit the core must be washed and stored for several days in dry environement. Now you can remove the brown skin around the core, which facilitates the germination a little bit.

Put the naked core into a small glass or other vessel so that the cone end is on the top. In our case we used an empty role of scotch tape to fix the position. Now simply fill the container with water only to the extent that the core is half covered. The tip of the avocado seed must show into the air. This arrangement must be put in a warm place and you must ensures that the water level always remains the same. Then it is time to wait.

It takes up to six weeks until a single root will be visible at the bottom of the core. Let the core in the glass until the root is several centimetres long.

After that you can plant the core into soil. This is also done, that the core stands half out of the ground. The best ground is low-nutrient potting soil. After some time, the core tip opens and sprouts its first leaves. The same method also works when the avocado core is directly planted into wet potting. But who wants to abstain to see the roots grow in the glass? And because you can not see the roots then, people usually think much too early, the core is dead and thros the poor thing into the trash. As we already said- it can take many weeks!

The avocado tends to produce only a single long branch. An early section can remedy the situation and causes that the avocado is forced to branch. Like that you will get a stately plant, instead of an unsightly tail.

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Finally, two important clues for further care of the avocado. The initial water demand is deceptive and is later no longer necessary, even harmful. Pour only moderately, because more avocado plants drowned than died of thirst! Likewise, you should not fertilize before the core is scruffy and gives the impression that its nutrients have fully displeted.